9 Responses to GW2: Another voice of the WvW problems

I always thought GW2 was a PvE game with PvP options. Playing it live, nothing really suggests otherwise. The prevalence of PvE objectives throughout the Frontiers (skill points, Vistas etc), the inclusion of small WvW objectives to the primarily PvE-oriented Monthly achievements, the sheer scale and quantity of PvE content compared to WvW and most especially the way that for all those seemingly-impressive Server bonuses a PvE player would never even notice from normal PvE gameplay whether his world was winning or losing … none of it ever suggested a game built around PvP/WvW.

A lot of the design decisions throughout GW2 that look mystifying to traditional MMO players are really familiar to anyone who played GW1, too. The concept of hitting max level two or three weeks after buying the game, then spending months or years grinding for appearance gear or achievement titles is part and parcel of how things worked in the older game, for example.

I think it’s going to be fascinating to see whether ArenaNet move their gameplay over time to match existing MMO expectations or stick with the somewhat oblique angle they’re coming from and let people acclimatize or drop out.

On the issue of server moves, are they still free? Assuming they are, won’t that be one problem that largely goes away once people have to pay to transfer?

Exactly because they brought over a lot of features from GW1 (as you say, hitting the level cap easily, gear and stat caps etc), my expectations were that this was a primarily PvP game with PvE on the side.I mean, it was known right from the start that there was no pve endgame in the traditional MMO sense, other than – as you say – grinding appearence gear. So, other than going for armor sets and exploration, the only thing left is to pvp.

Sure, there is also a lot of pve, but again that was the case in the original game as well. W.vs.W. was supposed to be the flagship of the game, much more than, say, the DEs. At least it got the most exposure.

…and the second fucking reply was some shitbag fanboy defending every design flaw in between bouts of fellating anet. criticize anything at all about the game or the dev/pub in game and the fanboys will literally fill the chat window with sperg. i’m worried, man. real worried.

Maggnus wrote a good post and I was very disappointed with how quickly some people dismissed his post. I am also puzzled at the map copy design. I also would love larger maps as long as they had some limited extra number of travel points between some of the larger keeps.

You know, suppressing the internal fanboy, he really does sum up a couple interesting issues facing WvW. That guild emblens can’t yet be prominently worn and cost 1G per piece(wtf!!!) is annoying. Queues are not an issue on my server (i don’t call 0-10min wait an issue), and you guys did roll on the highest pop server in the game so his issues are not mine. But it totally does hinder the idea of moving around to help where your server needs it most. At the same time it defeats the issue of even larger zergs moving around locust-bombing any keep/tower/supply post ad nauseum. Larger maps though? Wow – DAOC in the last year has made taking towers so easy that they flip constantly and its partly a result of the large maps meaning you run into less opponents. Currently on my server holding a tower requires upgrades and active defense, so not sure if the map size vs player load balance is that far off.

I think if they removed the automatic warnings on the map where is being attacked it would create more interesting scenarios.

From my current perspective of wvw as it stands a small group have no chance of taking over anything other than supply camps. Perhaps if they included warning fires or something of that ilk which forces players to activate it to warn others of attacks it would buy small groups of attackers time and also opens up the chance of stealth attacks.